


Battle Scars

by geekdawson



Category: Orphan Black (TV)
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-03-30
Updated: 2015-03-30
Packaged: 2018-03-20 10:52:20
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,170
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3647598
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/geekdawson/pseuds/geekdawson
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>In which I just throw some of my favorite Tony and Helena stories together and thread the common theme of scars through them. Cause who needs plot anyway? I’m just so enamored of this idea of these two scarred idiots bonding against all the odds.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Battle Scars

**Author's Note:**

> Every time I think about Tony and Helena I think about scars and what they mean. I don't think scars are beautiful or wonderful or special. I think they're just... part of who we are. And learning to let them be part of who we are seems important. And this is a little bit about that.

The rattling bang of the door to Felix’s loft slamming home almost the covered the yelp from Helena as Tony slid it closed behind him. He watched as she yanked her shirt down over her head, just catching a glimpse of the scars on the back facing him.

He didn’t say anything about it, just ran a thumb over his knuckles unconsciously, holding up a six pack with his other hand “Beer?” She jerked her head in a nod, and he stepped forward, holding out a bottle.

Her eyes seemed to jump-skip for a moment over his scarred knuckles and he grinned. “See? Nothin’ to be ashamed of, Goldilocks. We’ve all got old scars from old battles.” She snatched the beer out of his hand and ducked her head, and this time he wasn’t sure if it was a nod or an effort to hide her face.

He settled onto the far end of the couch. They drank in silence.

*****

Tony was pretty sure Helena wasn’t going to say word one to him on this whole camping trip (it’d been Sarah’s idea…for some “bonding time” between them). He was all right with the silence, a nice break from keeping up the charm around the others.

He tested the can of beans cooking by the fire. Once it was warm enough he separated it into two bowls, handed one to Helena. She began shoveling beans into her mouth.

"What do you think, Goldilocks?" He rumbled quietly from the other side of the fire, laying into his own dinner.

"Just right," Helena mumbled around a mouth full of beans. Tony looked up, startled. Helena gave him that fleeting, dorky smile, the one that made her look so much younger, more innocent…like a child one might read the story of Goldilocks to. Then quickly returned to her food.

He just chuckled and they finished their meal in silence.

*****

 

Helena and Tony would sometimes stay up late playing card games. They didn’t talk, but some silent accord kept them in one another’s company long into the night. Sometimes, closer toward the witching hour, Tony would roll up his sleeves and point out different scars and tell their story.

Helena never spoke of her scars. But sometimes she would tell stories of her life in the convent. Or list the copies she had killed, or describe the way she waited on buildings and behind bushes and in trees, or explain how to hold a rifle, how to tip a knife just so. And those were scars too, Tony knew.

Once, Sarah was restless on the couch while they were playing and Helena taught Tony a Ukranian lullaby that she used to sing to this stray dog she’d found outside the convent. Sarah settled in more peacefully as she sang it for him, and Tony pretended the story and song were for him.

With aching scars, they sat in silence. Somehow somehow seeing one another in the dark.

******

"Oh god, Felix, what do we do?" Alison was pacing, hand hovering uncertainly near her cheek.

"We have to do SOMETHING," Cosima insisted from her place on the couch. She was tired and her voice rasped. A voice of action, but without the strength to enact it.

"All right, all right, we’ll figure something out," Felix nodded, decisively, "we’ll get her back."

Tony was lurking in a corner, listening to the flurry of pacing and anxious discussion about what to do after Alison burst into Felix’s loft with some wild story about men snatching Sarah out on the street on their way over. He was leaning against the wall, listening, but eyes following a head of blonde hair as it disappeared to the other end of the loft.

As Helena re-emerged from around the corner of Felix’s bed, rifle case in hand, Tony kicked off from the wall. She locked eyes with him, silent pack accord taking hold of these barely tame animals. Their family was in danger. They’d fought too long without one to allow that.

He strode over to Felix and grabbed him roughly by the shoulder, “We’ll figure something out?! We’re going to need a better plan than that, Fee Fee.” Felix shrugged him off, but as they all turned to scold him for his roughness, a blonde head of wild curls disappeared out the door, one hand hefting a rifle case, the other feeling for her knife.

******

He was swimming up through the dark, a tune echoing around in his head. He was so very thirsty, and he hummed to himself, because he couldn’t actually sing, throat raw and dry, but the music was there, drawing him back up out of the darkness.

Slowly, slowly, he opened his eyes. Curtains and sterile white ceiling. What happened?

"You had surgery," A Ukranian voice that was somehow part of the music answered the question he hadn’t realized he’d spoken aloud. Wild blonde curls and dark eyes appeared above him. She almost smiled, setting a hand whisper soft against the gauze wrapping his chest. "Old battles, new scars, brother sestra."

He nodded, and let his eyes close again, sinking back down into the darkness.

Later, when he woke up properly, and the nurse handed him a cup of water he looked around, but there was no sign of Helena. The nurse, when he described her accent and wild curls, said that she hadn’t seen anyone and frowned, apparently at the idea he’d had a visitor he wasn’t supposed to.

He was never sure if she was really there, or just a figment of his imagination. Helena never mentioned it, and he didn’t really want to know for sure.

*****

People stared. But they hung out on the beach anyway, Tony shirtless for the first time, and Helena anxious in board shorts and bikini top. Tony sprawled back on his towel, arms behind his head, soaking in the first sun onto his fading scars. One year to the day he’d waited (at his doctor’s insistence), but today he could finally lay out on the beach and soak it all in.

Helena sat next to him in the sand, building a castle and shifting her shoulders uncomfortably once in a while.

"You didn’t have to wear that, you know," Tony didn’t bother to turn his head. Helena had been squirming in that bikini top since she’d gotten into his car. "Just because I want to flaunt my scars doesn’t mean you have to."

She shrugged, patting more sand into place, “Old scars. New battles. Nothing to be ashamed of, yes?”

"I GOT IT, AUNT HELENA," Kira came pelting over, shouting at the top of her lungs, Sarah strolling behind her, shaking her head. Kira waved a little flag in the air triumphantly. Helena helped her stick it carefully in the top of the castle tower, as Sarah settled in on the other side of Tony.

And so they all sat and lay there and people stared and they didn’t care. Because while scars don’t disappear… they do heal.

**Author's Note:**

> I'm on tumblr. Come say hi if ya like: geekdawson


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